Ted Simons: Arizona celebrates its 100th birthday tomorrow, but tonight we take a look at the state's colorful past by way of some remarkable images. They're from the vast collection of Jeremy Rowe, the owner of vintagephoto.com. Many of the photographs are featured in the centennial edition of Arizona Highways, including the image that graces the magazine's cover. Here now to talk about these historic photos and images is Jeremy Rowe. Good to see you again. Thanks for joining us.

Jeremy Rowe: Thank you.

Ted Simons: Before we get to all this, here's some great stuff we got for tonight. How do you find these things?

Jeremy Rowe: I think collecting -- I've been collecting for about 30 years, since grad school. Originally I -- I started collecting from a swap, and antique stores, flea markets, yard sales. There's a collectors' organization, several, that we sort of exchange things. So if I find Colorado material I can get it to someone in Colorado who gets me Arizona material. We work the exchange.

Ted Simons: You focus on Arizona material.

Jeremy Rowe: I like historic photography in general. I've got a strong Arizona collection, but I also do early 19th century, 20th century material as well.

Ted Simons: Let's look at some of your old Arizona photos, starting around I guess around 1898, a parade. It was the Indian cowboy parade?

Jeremy Rowe: Yes. They had a number of events like that to generate business in Phoenix. This is one that was a major event for a couple years and it tapered off again. They had rodeos along with this, a variety of images shot in the studio of Native Americans, cowboys and others, and this shows downtown Phoenix during that era.

Ted Simons: We're looking west I believe on Washington, the parade going east.

Jeremy Rowe: That's correct.

Ted Simons: Wow. Look at that. That is a lot -- what happened to this parade?

Jeremy Rowe: It tapered off, it didn't generate quite enough interest and the town grew, they started having fairs, the Maricopa County Fair, Arizona State Fair, other things started picking up instead of this, and transitioning on from in.

Ted Simons: From about the same time period we have a photograph of a baseball team sponsored by a local store?

Jeremy Rowe: Local store called the Beehive Store. This one shows the early baseball players with their home brew gear, it's interesting only eight people in union forges one is a manager. Whether he was in uniform periodically our not is up in the air.

Ted Simons: Doesn't make for much of a bench.

Jeremy Rowe: And if you look at the padding on the floor the gloves are thin, there's a thin pad that is the catcher's pad. Not a lot of safety either.

Ted Simons: Towns had teams, mining camps had teams?

Jeremy Rowe: It was a social event. You'd have globe playing Miami, or Bisbee playing Phoenix, and it was one of the major social events of the time. There was no movie theaters, other sorts of public events like that. So these tended to draw a lot of interest.

Ted Simons: This next photograph is of a cactus that looks like it's out in the middle of a field, an alfalfa field. Where do you think that is? That's probably not that far away from downtown.

Jeremy Rowe: It looks like it's on the route to sunny slope, but not quite there. North Phoenix, that neck of the woods. There are a number of images where they left the cactus in place and did things around them. Roads or fields. They would protect them for a while but overwatering for the alfalfa would eventually kill it this is an iconic image of Arizona.

Ted Simons: And really a farm that is now just so urban you would never even imagine an alfalfa field there. And that's because of the canals, correct? We've revived the canals and desert land blossoms.

Jeremy Rowe: The canals fed alfalfa and hay very early on. It was one of those things Phoenix was founded around. Development followed, and things expanded from there.

Ted Simons: This next photograph is fascinating, it shows the Adams Hotel, the original Adams Hotel I take it, burning. You don't see many photographs, this is someone who was pretty enterprising, around 1910, talk to us about this.

Jeremy Rowe: These buildings were made of wood and they tended to have wood heat, kerosene lighting, a variety of things that were fairly flammable. It didn't take much to set them off. They were packed tightly together. This one had a lot of open spaces so once a fire started it went very quickly. You can see the firemen in the back trying to cool the buildings next door. Fire was a major factor in most of the early Arizona towns. Many of the towns burned regularly, there wasn't a lot left, and they would be reborn for another few years and another fire with a take them down.

Ted Simons: Thus brick and steel. That was I believe at First Avenue and Washington?

Jeremy Rowe: First and Washington on the northeast corner I believe.

Ted Simons: All right. I gotcha. We got a picture of a sketch, I believe, of the Yuma Bridge over the Colorado River. And this was something that eventually occurred, but this -- what we're looking at is just an idea.

Jeremy Rowe: I think it's wonderful the photographer took the time to sketch the name with India ink on the negative to print on the image. It was a proposed bridge, and if you look in the corner, right below the bridge you can see there's a ferry boat. And that used to go across the Colorado before there was any railway bridge or railway bridge was replacing the ferry, but this replaced the auto bridge. And this is the view of the ferry boat with the proposed bridge on top. The brick looks somewhat similar to that in that location where it was built later.

Ted Simons: I guess built in 1914, opened in 1915, but this sketch was five years earlier.

Jeremy Rowe: About five years before that. They were trying to generate funds and interest in that. One of the first parts of the cross country road system that helped tie the United States together. It was a very important gap in that system.

Ted Simons: I know back in the day when official business was done there wasn't a lot of laughing and high-fiving. But when President Taft signs the bill, signs Arizona into statehood, the photograph you have, I'm not seeing a lot of yucks, no smiles. What's going on?

Jeremy Rowe: It was a very somber event. There had been a lot of controversy about Arizona becoming a state. They had been trying to become a state for a number of years. Arizona was fairly progressive and had a provision to recall judges that was not liked by Taft and many of the others in Washington, DC. So our statehood was blocked for a period of time. Once that was changed, we were signed into statehood, and very quickly Arizona put that provision back in which is the sort of gotcha. I had a feeling they may have thought that might have been coming.

Ted Simons: He looks exactly like he knows what's coming. The next photograph is a pawn shop, an all in one sort of shop in Oatman, Arizona. Oatman is a fascinating place. Talk to us about it, especially it was a big deal, kind of revived and now what's going on there?

Jeremy Rowe: It's like any of the towns that have become ghost towns, it was a very active mining community in the teens, 1915-1920, 1925, it's just a little to the west of Kingman between Kingman and the river. And if you go up that area you can still see many of the buildings still in place. These communities tended to be driven by the mines, a strike, a huge flurry of activities and they would go to the next strike and move on. Recycling materials, reselling materials is a big business. Folks like Lou Grossman who ran these shops set up these pawn shops and had amazing amounts of material and they were sort after focal point for the town and would move on from place to place.

Ted Simons: And the town is named after Olive Oatman who is, we can't go into it now, that's a story in and of itself. If you're ever interested, look that one up. It's great stuff. The next one, anyone who's been to Papago Park would say, I bet that looks very familiar. Except for the part of Chuckawalla Slim, who is Chuckawalla Slim?

>> A gentleman, sort of another one of the entrepreneurs that came to Arizona, his original name was Ed Voss. He was in the navy during World War I. He got out and went into the merchant Marines and got seasick too much, so he came to Arizona and started trading Indian jewelry, rocks, and others. He was active for many years. He moved to California but still came to Arizona for decades, literally. A friend of mine in Prescott bought jewelry from him in the 1960s.

Ted Simons: Interesting.

Jeremy Rowe: Wonderful character and sort of an iconic image of Arizona. That's one of the images they used in the Arizona Highways book.

Ted Simons: I think I recognize -- speaking of I think I recognize the cactus this, next one, I think, this is we think Stanford Drive, if you go up 44th it's the first big light past Camelback. Correct?

Jeremy Rowe: Yeah.

Ted Simons: So looking east toward Camelback Mountain, this is a 1930 or so, so it's a dirt road, I think that cactus is still there in the middle of the road.

Jeremy Rowe: That one is probably not but there are similar ones sprinkled all over the place. This is an example of keeping the icon in place and a dirt road going along one side, and it expand the across, and disappeared. This is probably just a little farther west of 44th Street looking toward Echo Canyon.

Ted Simons: Basically 44th Street is between us and that mountain in that shot.

Jeremy Rowe: Yes.

Ted Simons: Isn't that something. Ernest Hall, this photograph is interesting because this guy wound up being a Secretary of State and Acting Governor and he is surrounded by woodpeckers? What is this?

Jeremy Rowe: Arizona had a number of people that rose to prominence and fell from that fame. He collected woodpecker holes. This is his collection of woodpecker holes. We had people like Charles Poston who is also a major figure that became a street person later in his life, had a decorative burrow and donkey he carried around town and generated funds with.

Ted Simons: Again, Secretary of State at one time, Acting Governor at one time.

Jeremy Rowe: Wonderful example of vernacular architecture that is no longer here. Phoenix has been good at removing these buildings over time, but this is a classic and is used to demonstrate that style of vernacular architecture across the country in books and magazines. It was the Northwest corner of Seventh and McDowell, and you can see it's an open air building, it had French doors.

Ted Simons: That is something. Fox Theater, this was a massive public movie house, and I think you mentioned that it seated about 1800 folks, that's like how much of a percent of the population?

Jeremy Rowe: About 4% of the population of Phoenix at that time, which is phenomenal. Looking at growth back then, trying to build at that level. It was the movie palace in town. Very, very opulent, very thick carpet, very thick elaborate curtains, chandeliers and so on. I was lucky enough to be in Phoenix when it was active, and actually worked for a friend there for a period of time during the summer in high school. Just an unbelievable building.

Ted Simons: Located where?

Jeremy Rowe: On Washington just west of Central Avenue.

Ted Simons: OK. Fascinating. Air conditioned --

Jeremy Rowe: One of the first air conditioned big buildings in the Phoenix area. It was a very popular place.

Ted Simons: That was a postcard, this is Sky Harbor from about 1950s when I guess this new terminal and tower, that just looks like old Arizona. Doesn't it?

Jeremy Rowe: You can see the development all around the airport now that would just block the shot in. This is 1952, just after the first tower was built. The tower has been moved to the other side. But, yeah, at this point there were a whole 42 flights a day scheduled into this, and that was the high point of Sky Harbor Airport during that era.

Ted Simons: Real quickly we got about 30 seconds or so, it's got to be rewarding, it's almost like a treasure hunt when you find these postcards.

Jeremy Rowe: Everyone has a story, and trying to find the story, dating it, background material, photographers who did the work, photographs I consider primary resource materials, just like text and many people have not seen that, but the more you understand about them the more you can pull those stories and weave them together and hopefully share them.

Ted Simons: You've done a great job. Thank you so much for sharing your images with us. Good stuff. Happy birthday to Arizona, huh?

Jeremy Rowe: Happy birthday to Arizona.

Ted Simons: Thank you for being here. Tuesday on "Arizona Horizon" we'll celebrate Arizona's Centennial with the state's official historian and official Balladeer, and we'll show you how a dirt lot in Downtown Phoenix grew into a model of sustainability. That's Tuesday on "Arizona Horizon," 5:30 and 10:00 right here on eight H.D. That is it for now. I'm Ted Simons. Thank you so much for joining us. You have a great evening.

Public Sector Union Bills

Arizona State Lawmakers are considering several bills that limit the power of labor unions for public sector employees, including police and firefighters. The sponsor of the bills, Republican Senator Rick Murphy, and Democratic Senator David Lujan debate the legislation.

Ted Simons: Good evening, and welcome to "Arizona Horizon." I'm Ted Simons. The Tucson lawmaker who succeeded Gabrielle Giffords in the state senate after Giffords was elected to Congress is now looking to succeed Jose Herrera Capitol Hill. State senator Paula Aboud of Tucson says she will run for Congressional District 2. That newly drawn southern Arizona district contains Cochise County and most of Pima County including areas that are now part of CD 8, Giffords’ former district. A special election takes place this spring to elect someone to complete the remainder of Giffords' term in CD 8. Her former aide Ron Barber has announced he is running in that election. Senator Aboud will face Representative Mark Heinz and perhaps others.

Ted Simons: State lawmakers are considering bills that put new restrictions on labor unions for government employees. The bills would ban collective bargaining and automatic payroll deductions for union dues and stop local governments from compensating employees for union works. Joining me now is the sponsor of the bill, Senator Rick Murphy, a Republican from Peoria, and Senator David Lujan, a Democrat opposing the measures. Good to have you here. Thanks for joining us. Let's get started with why you're sponsoring most of these bills.

Sen. Rick Murphy: There's four bills which cover similar topics and have some overlap. I'm sponsoring three of the four bills. Essentially it seems like with all the budget problems that we've had the last few years, both nationally and at the state level, even at the city level, we've reached a tipping point where it's become clear that the amount of government that we have and the cost of that government is not sustainable. And it seems as though the unions, the government worker unions have a disproportionate amount of influence compared with the taxpayer when it comes to setting those budgets, setting the work rules, etc.

Ted Simons: Why do you think it's a bad idea, these bills?

Sen. David Lujan: I think it's unfortunate. A time we should be trying to prop up middle class families, we have these bills that are brought on by the Tea Party Republicans that are really trying to take away their voice in government. And the people who are affected by these, these are taxpayers as well, firefighters, law enforcement, our teachers. And they deserve to have a voice in government and these bills are essentially taken away -- taking away that voice.

Sen. Rick Murphy: First of all, they still have a voice, that's ridiculous. But also to try to say this is a war on the middle class or anything like that is ridiculous. The vast majority of the middle class is not in a union at all, much less in a government union. And secondly, when we talk about teachers and firefighters and police, the reality is we have more government workers that don't do those jobs that do do those jobs. So those are brought out because they're more sympathetic, but there's a lot of other folks involved as well.

Ted Simons: The idea of saving state and local governments hundreds of millions of dollars, talk to us about that and why that's not necessarily a good idea the way it's being proposed.

Sen. David Lujan: I think it's really deceiving. These employee unions do save money. It's interesting, in committee when we heard these bills, not a single city said we need these bills. They find this in contrary they find these a useful management tool in order to effectively deal with employee associations and make sure they are getting the best bang for their buck. I would also say these employee organizations are very effective in weeding out waste in government. If you have a manager, for example, that is misspending public funds, who's more likely to speak out than the workers who are working under that person every day, and they have that protection through these employee unions.

Ted Simons: Helping foster good relationships with public workers is mentioned as a management tool. The idea of this tool, collective bargaining with unions, is a good way to get that relationship going, get the communication going, just make for an easier way to deal with things.

Sen. Rick Murphy: If only that were so. It's not a balanced relationship, that's the problem. You've got folks who help elect their bosses, first of all, and then they come and they sit at the bargaining table to negotiate. And the taxpayers on the other hand who also had a hand in electing those leaders, they don't have anybody who is speaking just for them at the bargaining table. It's just not a balanced playing field and it ends up tilting in favor of workers and favorable work rules and favorable pay and bonuses -- pay and benefits and pensions to the taxpayers' detriment.

Ted Simons: Unfair edge over citizens in terms of pull at city halls, with supervisors, at the state house. Valid argument?

Sen. David Lujan: No. Not at all. Who are we dealing with? We're talking about our law enforcement, firefighters, first responders, these are people who put their lives on the line for us every day. And they choose to use their hard-earned dollars to have these associations represent them whether it's before their employer or in front of public bodies. Because they recognize they can do an effective job of representing their interests. So I think when you're talking about workers and having a voice in government, these employee associations are very useful for these workers.

Sen. Rick Murphy: Well, except that what's come out in the hearings is that they're not only using their own money. For example, when employees, when government employees are doing work on the taxpayer dollar, called release time, they're not paid by the unions to do this, they are given time off of their regular job where they're still receiving a regular paycheck to do this. And the testimony in committee was that overall compensation for the entire class of employees is reduced to make up for that time, but that means that time is being subsidized by the nonmembers who are also in that same group of workers.

Ted Simons: Why compensate someone for doing union work on the job?

Sen. David Lujan: Because it's effectively saving those government entities money. For example, going back to law enforcement, let's say an officer is involved in a shooting or incident, there's a lot of administrative hearings that go along with being in law enforcement, being a firefighter. And so this gives them that representative to go up against their employer and a lot of times those representatives are people that are on release time. So they're doing work on behalf of the taxpayers, they're doing work to make sure that that officer, that firefighter that their rights are being protected.

Sen. Rick Murphy: Well, in the case of officers, that's a unique situation. There's not really an --

Sen. David Lujan: But they're included in this bill.

Sen. Rick Murphy: And I've been in talks them and I've assured the local law enforcement folks, if they're doing a job such as representing somebody who's been involved in a complaint or incident, and they are bringing an independent perspective to that discussion, then I'm certainly willing to work with them on that. But the vast majority of the release time is not something that is, you know, as noble sounding as that.

Sen. David Lujan: Release time could be a teacher representing employees and making sure that if there's a bad teacher, they're effectively working with the school district to weed that teacher out so the district doesn’t have to spend taxpayer dollars going through a litigation.

Ted Simons: Is that happening?

Sen. David Lujan: It does happen. As a member of a school board I saw many instances where the teacher representative who was on release time helped to negotiate with the district to get bad employees out and to save the school district money.

Ted Simons: Critics of what you're doing say that they understand what you're doing, but you're taking the wrong approach and you're possibly doing more harm than good with this particular approach. How do you respond to that?

Sen. Rick Murphy: Most of the people making that claim are the people who benefit from the status quo. The reality is, the people in charge of government unions have power and they don't want to give that up. It's really not about what's best for the taxpayer. I was on a school board too and I have -- I know in my experience getting rid of bad teachers was very difficult and most of the time the unions made excuses for it.

Ted Simons: I think there's some that are not necessarily involved in this fight, but look at it from both sides of the aisle and say this is not necessarily the kind of fight that cities, towns, the state needs to pick right now.

Sen. Rick Murphy: Sometimes there's not a good time, but do you what you think is right, and it just so happened this is one I happen to be chairman of the government reform committee and it seemed like as good a time as any.

Ted Simons: The idea that something needs to be done, between pension and compensation, there's arguments that the public workers and unions are getting paid more than the same kinds of workers, I know that goes back and forth as well. That's something needs to be done, why not this?

Sen. David Lujan: Because this isn't a problem. Nobody, no city, no town, no government body has come to the legislature and said, we need to have these types of reforms. I think where you might see is in pensions, and we've had pension reform at the legislature last year, but time and time again, government managers have said the collective bargaining and the public employee unions are a benefit to them. What this is, is the Tea Party Republicans being upset with the unions having too much power, you have Senator Murphy who sponsored this legislation, yet since 2005 he's taken over close to $2,000 in money from the same employee unions for his campaigns.

Ted Simons: Talk about that.

Sen. Rick Murphy: Well, first of all, that's a small percentage of all contributions I've ever had, number one. Number two, the reality is, they have a disproportionate influence, and the fact nobody that they negotiate with has concerns about it is kind of making my point for me. They have too cozy of a relationship, there's not enough balance, the taxpayers don't have enough voice, and when you have the city of Phoenix raising food taxes by when was it, 12 or 14 million dollars, and having a similar amount of money that was paid out in retention bonuses when people are having a hard time finding a job to begin with, that just sounds to me as though we've got a problem.

Ted Simons: Last word --

Sen. David Lujan: Some of the things I've seen employee unions come to the legislature and testify about is more funding for bulletproof vests, more funding for fire engines and fire equipment. These are organizations that are protecting our public service employees, our first responders, our teachers, at a time when we should be propping up these middle class workers, we're trying to tear them down and I don't think it's the solution.